“. . . they came to Capernaum. And when he was in the house he asked them, ‘What were you discussing on the way?’ But they kept silent, for on the way thy had argued with one another about who was the greatest.” Mark 9:33

Generally speaking, Fellowship requires words. It is only when they cease to flow between us that we realize that it is likely the fellowship, like the exchange of words, has fallen out of use.

In his biography, “When Breath Becomes Air,” the young neurosurgeon Paul Kalanithi, wrote, “I had come to see language as an almost supernatural force, existing between people, bringing our brains, shielded in centimeter-thick skulls, into communion.”

Now, get this. He ends that thought by saying, “A word meant something only between people and life’s meaning, its virtue, had something to do with the depth of the relationships we form.”

What are words, if not a miracle? What is fellowship, if not the same? What is it about our choice of words that can shatter the beauty of brains in communion?

Generally speaking, from the instant of birth to the moment of death, the voice of another conveys meaning to us by the choice of words. In the case of Dr. Paul Kalanithi, as he was rushed into ICU he whispered to his wife, “This might be how it ends.”